It feels somewhat sickening to realise halfway through that what you are reading, no matter how well written, is AI-generated. Soon the only way to know if something you are consuming is not AI-generated is to talk to a person face to face. Maybe generative AI will bring back people to normal social skills.

Reading notes 'Clear Thinking'

 Reading notes on 'Clear Thinking' by Pherson, Donner, and Gnad.

Chapter 2

System 1 thinking reaches judgment quickly and effortlessly. It is simplistic processing. It is more prone to unconscious errors. Heuristics help but can also introduce misinterpretations. System 1 operates automatically and quickly. You do not summon it.

System 2 kicks in when we need to think deliberately. It is slow thinking.

The brain is a collection of neurons (which hold memory), connected by synapses. Synapses are dynamic.They constantly build, rebuild. The more frequently we access memory in a neuron, the stronger the synapses linked to it become. The stronger the connection, the faster we can retrieve the memory. The more frequent a neuron is accessed, the synapses connected to it become wider, like the growth of a tamped path into a highway.

Neuronal plasticy means the brain physically changes.

Intuition is recognition of a pattern we have seen before. Ween we have stored a train of thought a certain way, it becomes difficult to retrieve this information in some other way.

This fixed arrangement is called a schema. We have innumerable schema. Examples of schemas include: appropriate foods for breakfast. Where to eat breakfast in the house, how to write a complex report.

System 1 is is our interpretation of reality. It is how we perceive our environment.

System 2 kicks in when we do not automatically have an answer to a problem, an we are aware that we do not.

My own example: if you meet a tiger in the forest, you immediately seek cover. This is system 1 in action. After you have successfully found saftey, you begin to think of how to get out of this situation with the tiger still lurking. This is system 2, especially when you have not been in this situation before.

Analysis work often means coming to conclusions while working with incomplete data. System 1 is very proficient in recognising patterns but often jumps to conclusions prematurely.

System 1 does not present alternatives it rejected.

(Note: System 1 sounds very similar to AI when it fills in incorrect information)

Reflection on Roger Schank's 'Expectation Failure'. Schank suggests that learning is achieved through expectation failure. You have a mental model for how something works, then you encounter an event or data that breaks your mental model. You incorporate that new information and adjust your mental model. 

The strongest way to learn is to have a hypothesis and then act on it. For example, knowing how a saw works in your head and then actually using a saw to cut wood and realising it's rather hard to cut perfectly straight. 

A weaker version of expectation failure is encountering new information you were not looking for. For example, reading leisurely about France and learning that it was called Gaul in ancient times.

The implication is that the learning by doing is a far more effective way of learning than reading and absorbing facts. Unused facts dissipate from memory far more quickly.

Two of the best aphorisms that conveys the truth of this world:

Time and tide wait for no man. The world keeps moving on. It won't wait for you. Don't waste time. Opportunities come and go. They won't wait for you. Someone else may spot them and grab them. Be ready to grab opportunities. 

You go to war with the army you have. War (any undesirable circumstance) occurs. They are inevitable. You are forced deal with them with the capabilities you have available, so always be building up your capabilities. It's also a reminder that the way you should engage the 'war' reflects the capabilities you have, not the capabilities you wish you had. Be practical and realistic, know yourself and your capabilities.

WIN - A Formula for Success

W stands for 'will'. An indomitable will is sometimes required. If there's a will there's a way. A willingness to succeed. Ambition. 

I stands for 'intelligence'. This covers the ability to think strategically, skills and capabilities to do something. To pick the right objectives, the right paths.

N stands for 'negotiation'. This covers the social ability to navigate with and through people. You cannot achieve much by yourself.  Eg you want to be a successful writer? You still need to work with people.

 Are certfications valuable? Consider how many cybersecurity certifications are available. Yet hackers and scammers do not have to acquire certifications to achieve their capabilities. 

When you try to apply guidances and frameworks from books and struggle to make them work in the real world, consider this perspective: the guidance you find in books are merely guides to touch up and polish what you need to do. They cannot contain everything you need to do. But they do provide advise that helps you polish what you need to do. Whoever wrote the book you are reading doesn't know your particular circumstance, so they absolutely cannot provide specific advice. But they can provide general advice. The value of knowledge contained in books is they expose you to ideas and experience that others have encountered and learned. It is still up to you to apply them appropriately to your situation.

Are Business Rules Requirements?

Business organisations use information systems to streamline their operations. May of the activities that would be done by people are performed by software. The rules that the people would have followed are also embedded in the software so that the software would be able to follow the same rules. An example of such rules is: If the due date for an invoice lands on a weekend, move it to the next working day.

Software is built with reference to requirements that have been identified as needed to make the software useful. Manny of these requirements are functional. They specify what that software should do. For example: Generate an invoice when an order has been shipped. This requirement says that the software must a) generate an invoice, and b) only when an order has been shipped.  

Other businesses using the same software may want the invoice to be generated just before shipment as they will pack the invoice with the shipment.

One different between functional requirements and business requirements is that a functional requirement is about the purpose of the software. Why are we building it. Business rules are about the contraints that the software needs to follow when it does what it does.

Business rules can come from different areas of the business. Some may come from the accounting department. Some may come from the regulatory compliance department. Some may come from the payments and collection department. Or taxation. Or operations. 

What is common is that they are rules that other entities in the organisation also need to follow, whereas the functional requirements are requirements only on the software in question.

Writing is Speaking

From Lucile Vaughan Payne, in her book "The Lively Art of Writing. Understanding Forms"

All writing is the sound of one voice speaking, and all writing can be heard. Every sentence you write, the instant it is read—even when it is read in absolute silence—is heard by the reader as clearly as your actual voice would be heard if you were speaking face to face. When you write, your writing is your voice. Your sound. You.

This is a very important reminder to review your writing and make sure it sounds like your own voice and not in some affected manner. 

Program Evaluation

In the world of project management, a "program" (spelled as "programme" in the UK) is a set of projects that share a common program-level objective. 

A bank that needs to comply with new regulations may set up a project to revise technology platforms, another project to review the obligations and document what the bank has to do, another project to upgrade business processes to meet the regulations, another project to develop and deliver training to staff. And finally, a program that oversees and integrates the work of all these projects.

A clear boundary exists between projects and programs on the one hand, and operations on the other hand. The project and program team delivers the requested change. The operations team operate the business under the new changes. Hopefully what is delivered by the project and program team enables the operations team to meet the regulations.

Responsibilities are clearly delineated. The project and program team are only responsible for delivering what it was asked of. They are not responsible for operational compliance with regulations. The operations team is not responsible for what is to be delivered. They are just the recipients, but they are responsible and accountable for meeting the regulations.

It is obvious that this arrangement leaves the door open to problems. In practice, the operations team work closely with the project and program teams to ensure that what is delivered is what the operations team needs.

There is another discipline that uses the word 'program'. This discipline does not sit within the project management world. In Program Evaluation, a program refers to the operation of the new world. Its purpose is to evaluate whether and how well the new operation is being executed an how well it is delivering on the benefits that were the basis for why the program was undertaken.

Schools are heavy users of program evaluations. They implement (or are forced to implement) a program to improve the reading abilities of their primary school students. Program evaluation assesses the ongoing success of the program and as appropriate recommends adjustments.